This article is the second part of a 4 segments series on team building methods. If you have found this article through search engines (Google, Bing, Yahoo, etc.) I would recommend you start by reading the head piece of the series – The 8 best team building methods – to get an overall view on…
8 Best Team Building Methods – Belbin and Maccoby Methods
This article is the first part of a 4 segments series on best team building methods. If you have found this article through search engines (Google, Bing, Yahoo, etc.) I would recommend you start by reading the head piece of the series – The 8 best team building methods – to get an overall view…
8 Best Team Building Methods You Should Know
Before we get into talking about team building methods I want to make one thing clear. Team building and managing is difficult and even the best managers can get it wrong sometimes. In the 1966 World Cup Final Alf Ramsey took the unpopular decision to leave out his star striker for the final against West…
Resources Conflicts, This is How to Have it All
Most project organizations exist in a multi-project environment. This environment creates the problems of project inter dependency and the need to share resources. For example, what would be the impact on the labor resource pool of a construction company if it should win a contract it would like to bid on? Will existing labor be…
Organization Politics, How To Become The Puppet Master
Organization politics exist in every office and can have a significant influence on the portfolio management system when it comes to which projects receive funding and high priority. This is especially true when the criteria and process for selecting projects are ill-defined and not aligned with the mission of the firm. Project selection may be based…
Implementation Gap, A Real Problem Even Today
In organizations with short product life cycles, it is interesting to note that frequently participation in strategic planning and implementation includes participants from all levels within the organization. However, in perhaps 80 percent of the remaining product and service organizations, top management pretty much formulates strategy and leaves strategy implementation to functional managers. This will…
Negotiation Framework: Focus On The Problem
Too often personal relations become entangled with the substantive issues under consideration. Instead of attacking the problem(s), people attack each other. Once people feel attacked or threatened their energy naturally goes to defending themselves, and they loose focus on the problem at hand. The key, then, is to focus on the problem—not the other person—during…
Negotiation Framework: Focus on Interests
Negotiations often stall when people focus on interests: I’m willing to pay $10,000. No, it will cost $15,000. I need it done by Monday. That’s impossible, we can’t have it ready until Wednesday. While such interchanges are common during preliminary negotiation discussions, managers must prevent this initial posturing from becoming polarized. When such positions are…
Negotiation Framework: Mutual Gain and Objective Criteria
I have to say that this may be the simplest and yet one of the most powerful negotiation framework out there. I have done some reading on the subject in the last few weeks and I have ended up to the conclusion that Fisher and Ury have something in this 4 step approach that has…
Managing customer relationships framework
Managing customer relationships begins during the preliminary project approval phase of negotiations. It is important to avoid the temptation to oversell the virtues of a project to win approval because this may create unrealistic expectations that may be too difficult, if not impossible, to achieve. At the same time, project proponents have been known to…